Expert: Comey brings rough week to White House, and it's not over yet

St. Petersburg — The last week has been one crisis after another for the White House.

Author:
Mark Rivera

Published:
11:49 PM EDT May 16, 2017

ST. PETERSBURG — The last week has been one crisis after another for the White House.

The latest surrounds reports of a memo by former FBI Director James Comey in which he says President Trump asked him to end an investigation into former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn.

I sat down with our political expert Lars Hafner to find out why the memo could mean a serious turning point for the Trump Administration.

MARK RIVERA: If this is the real deal, what does the memo mean?

LARS HAFNER: Well, this is the first evidence, concrete evidence, once they produce the memo, that would actually show the Trump presidency trying to impede the Justice Department and in particular the FBI in an investigation of Russia.

So what we've had here is a lot of drip, drip, drip, about Russia, but now those trips are turning into dots, and Congress is going to start connecting those dots. And this is a big one because this could actually motivate them to hold hearings and, if the memos produced and Comey testifies, to potentially start impeachment charges.

RIVERA: If this happens as James Comey says it did where President Trump, back in February, asked him to stop the investigation into former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, wouldn't James Comey at that time have had to say something or brief Congress or say, ‘Hey, listen, the president is trying to interfere with my investigation my independent investigation?’

HAFNER: That does go against the integrity argument of 'Jim called me,' and that's what the other side – the Trump team – will start to use against him. So what he is done basically is probably trying to keep his job, deflected, thought he could do more good as directing the investigation into Russia then if he stepped aside blew the whistle and walked away from it.